Literacy in itself is no education. It is not the end of the education, nor even the beginning" - Mahatma Gandhi
In the words of the father of our nation, "By Education, I mean an all-round drawing out of the best in the child and man-body, mind and spirit". Governments publish the data of the rate of literacy in the country but are sufficient? Definitely, literacy is the first step in the direction to get the education but only literacy must never be confused with the term " Education".
Literacy is limited to basic knowledge of letters and numbers which enables a person to read and write but, shaping the thought process and developing the character is what the role of education is.
First of all, the purpose of education has to be very clear. It is not as good as receiving the information and knowing and memorizing too much of everything. If this would be so, then in today's time, as such there is no need to get educated, since everything is just one click away on the internet and Google alone can be proved a most competent teacher. The real purpose of education in our schools should be to awaken the possibility in the person. makes them aware of their own potential, shaping their thoughts in a manner which can conduce to the service of the society, development of character to help one lead a fulfilling life.
Since when a child goes to school, his mind is a clean slate, therefore, our education system must be of the type which does not kill the possibilities in them by loading their mind with pre-conceived notions or fear of the unseen future or unsuccessful experiences of the past. The system should be for making them able to develop their own thoughts, explore life in their own way and make them able to have their own experiences.
It should create an environment which helps them creating thurst and quest for knowledge, which will then help them to go on the path of continuous learning throughout the life. Therefore, all the subjects need to be taught in a manner that helps the children connect the lessons with their life. Tourism can play an effective role in this. Before teaching a lesson, it should be conveyed to students what is the relevance of chapters in the life, because ultimately only then education would be relevant when after a child goes out from the school, he feels more connected with society.
Our education system must create awareness of multi-cultural, multi-religion and diverse nature of distinct societies so that a child begins to accept and embrace diversity should not go on the track of fundamentalism and fanaticism. Until only scoring high marks during the education and getting employment after getting the education will be the purpose of education, till then education will not be able to play its role of fostering the values in the people.
Therefore, broadening the scope of education to include practical aspects, conveying the broad purpose of education to children and teaching the moral lessons by himself living those lessons, connecting the books is the need of the hour to make education system effective. Ultimately, the purpose of education is not to be part of rat race but to assist a person in choosing his own race track.
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